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FCC plan would give Internet providers power to choose the sites customers see

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Re: FCC plan would give Internet providers power to choose the sites customers see

#401

Post by prions »

dmix wrote: post #361
shmerl wrote: post #208

Earlier quoted context omitted.

John Oliver found a good way to explain it: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fpbOEoRrHyU https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=92vuuZt7wak The problem is that ISP shills that make these decisions don't care about public opposition. They aren't elected officials.

> The problem is that ISP shills that make these decisions don't care about public opposition But they do care most about making money from the public and no one has convinced me that filtering internet packages by website makes any technical, marketing, or business model sense at all. This has proven to be incredibly unpopular idea with the public for over a decade as well, whenever it has come up in the press. It w…

What's different now is that we're seeing huge mergers between telecom companies and media companies.

The internet is more vital to everyone now than compared to 15 years ago. Every year more and more people are choosing to eschew traditional cable for Netflix et al.

With NN being repealed, it opens up ways for ISP's to promote their own content and shut out others like nothing that's happened before. This whole repeal smacks of anti-consumerism and pro corporate nonsense.

Re: FCC plan would give Internet providers power to choose the sites customers see

#402

Post by Karunamon »

dmix wrote: post #388
skywhopper wrote: post #382

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You have a choice of ISPs?

Yes, and if you are in the minority of people who don't this will incentivize every nerd in your area to create an ISP to offer unfiltered internet. But more importantly this doesn't depend on competition to make ISPs realize it's a bad idea either. The technical hurdles and push back from the tech companies, media, and public are being extremely underrated. This whole scenario is far more complicated than the ISPs m…

"Minority of people"? Most people are in a duopoly - the local telco, the local cableco. Not much in the way of competition.

Re: FCC plan would give Internet providers power to choose the sites customers see

#403

Post by dmix »

BinaryIdiot wrote: post #400
dmix wrote: post #388

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, and if you are in the minority of people who don't this will incentivize every nerd in your area to create an ISP to offer unfiltered internet. But more importantly this doesn't depend on competition to make ISPs realize it's a bad idea either. The technical hurdles and push back from the tech companies, media, and public are being extremely underrated. This whole scenario is far more complicated than the ISPs m…

> this will incentivize every nerd in your area to create an ISP to offer unfiltered internet Uh, how do you think these "nerds" are going to provide broadband? It's highly capital intensive to lay cabling so you're either going to piggyback off of someone like Comcast (who is going to charge you a lot) or you're going to piggyback off of someone's wireless which is also very expensive.

> you're either going to piggyback off of someone like Comcast

That was the solution in Canada to generate competition, as the laying of cables was subsidized already, it was never a free market, as I'm sure the telecom industry in the US was hardly a free market... not sure why it's such a crazy idea.

Why not focus on creating the basis for competition instead of centrally managing the intricacies of business... which has historically further limited competition.

And if two companies engage in monopolistic practices, such as colluding to offer the same packages, that should be the domain of antitrust courts.

Re: FCC plan would give Internet providers power to choose the sites customers see

#404

Post by woodrowbarlow »

jrs235 wrote: post #366

Wow. If my cable company (who I use only for internet access) decides to change pricing and it ends up costing me more to watch netflix (this includes if netflix increases its prices due to the cable company pushing back and charging netflix) then I will cancel both. I'll save more money and be free from the internet at home. I suppose that really is truly "Internet Freedom"!

it isn't Netflix or Facebook or Google you should be worried about. it's the startup company trying to launch a competing service.

imagine having to pay your ISP extra money for the privilege of using a privacy-oriented search tool like Duck Duck Go over Google... and none of the money you pay goes towards Duck Duck Go.

Re: FCC plan would give Internet providers power to choose the sites customers see

#405

Post by wuliwong »

ghewgill wrote: post #89

For those who don't understand why net neutrality is important, it is worthwhile to read about the history of communications (telephone, radio, TV). There is an excellent book by Tim Wu called The Master Switch [0] which investigates the history of communications (with an American focus), describes how each industry start out open to all (farmers using fences for telephone, independent radio broadcasters), and each o…

There is a strongly contrasting view of the history of radio in the United States [1].

[1] https://mises.org/library/spectrum-should-be-private-propert...

Re: FCC plan would give Internet providers power to choose the sites customers see

#406

Post by notirk »

mring33621 wrote: post #379
guiambros wrote: post #307

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The argument that Netflix needs to pay Comcast is absurd. Absurd for you, not for the carriers. And, unfortunately, they are the ones dealing the cards now. Outrageous, for sure, but according to Chairman Pai's plan, carriers will be able to charge both consumers and content providers.

That's fine. If the charges are onerous enough, then the content providers may choose to build new carriers of their own.

That's fine?! Consider the fixed costs of building a new carrier! Today's carriers will price it below where it makes sense to "build your own carrier", these costs will be distributed among consumers and we'll all be paying more for the same access we have today. The only difference is today's carriers have higher profits and a stranglehold on our access to the internet.

Re: FCC plan would give Internet providers power to choose the sites customers see

#407

Post by ufo »

febeling wrote: post #121

Suppose the majority of ISPs was to move to a direction were some significant portion of internet services was "shaped" or throttled in some way that was imposing real disadvantages or inconveniences for the user: wouldn't that open a seizable opportunity for a new player to offer "real" unrestricted connectivity? I believe it if someone walks us through the incentive structure here step by step, or explains the natu…

In the US at least, the ISP owns the infrastructure. Many ISPs also have monopolies over "last mile" copper and fiber connections because regulations were originally written assuming that different modes (off the air radio, cellular, etc) would be enough to allow competition.

Re: FCC plan would give Internet providers power to choose the sites customers see

#408

Post by shmerl »

dmix wrote: post #361
shmerl wrote: post #208

Earlier quoted context omitted.

John Oliver found a good way to explain it: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fpbOEoRrHyU https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=92vuuZt7wak The problem is that ISP shills that make these decisions don't care about public opposition. They aren't elected officials.

> The problem is that ISP shills that make these decisions don't care about public opposition But they do care most about making money from the public and no one has convinced me that filtering internet packages by website makes any technical, marketing, or business model sense at all. This has proven to be incredibly unpopular idea with the public for over a decade as well, whenever it has come up in the press. It w…

> This would be a boon to any ISP who DIDN'T do this. Competition, and obvious lack of business sense, has always been a far larger counter-balance to this idea.

Competition surely can help, but currently there is no competition in a lot of places. It's basically monopoly / oligopoly situation, with collusion and market division to boot. So increasing competition is a good goal, but it shouldn't block preventing monopolistic abuse with legal means.

Monopolists also created a lot of blockers that prevent increasing competition. Such as local state laws that ban municipal networks which could solve this very problem.

Re: FCC plan would give Internet providers power to choose the sites customers see

#409

Post by dragonwriter »

dmix wrote: post #375
jrs235 wrote: post #366

Wow. If my cable company (who I use only for internet access) decides to change pricing and it ends up costing me more to watch netflix (this includes if netflix increases its prices due to the cable company pushing back and charging netflix) then I will cancel both. I'll save more money and be free from the internet at home. I suppose that really is truly "Internet Freedom"!

> then I will cancel both. Which is exactly why it won't happen even if they were given the option... Everyone would flock to the ISPs who didn't do this. Or to technology options such as encryption and VPNs to circumvent it, while still using the cheaper packages. Selective internet packages has been an incredibly unpopular idea among the public and has been for over a decade. I'm not sure why people think the only…

> I'm not sure why people think the only that has held ISPs back from doing this is a 3yr old FTC regulation

The FCC has been enforcing neutrality principles since 2004, through case-by-case actions through 2010, and through regulatory orders in 2010 and 2015. Even in the brief window between case-by-case enforcement being struck down in 2010 and the 2010 Open Internet Order and the longer window between the 2010 Order being struck down and the 2015 Order, there was a clear regulatory direction which gave non-neutral activity a high-risk of being unsustainable and thus not worth investing in. There is very little competition in ISPs in most areas and very high barriers to entry; it isn't competition that has been controlling non-neutral behavior.

Re: FCC plan would give Internet providers power to choose the sites customers see

#410

Post by CodeWriter23 »

dmix wrote: post #361
shmerl wrote: post #208

Earlier quoted context omitted.

John Oliver found a good way to explain it: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fpbOEoRrHyU https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=92vuuZt7wak The problem is that ISP shills that make these decisions don't care about public opposition. They aren't elected officials.

> The problem is that ISP shills that make these decisions don't care about public opposition But they do care most about making money from the public and no one has convinced me that filtering internet packages by website makes any technical, marketing, or business model sense at all. This has proven to be incredibly unpopular idea with the public for over a decade as well, whenever it has come up in the press. It w…

You know what was different 15 years ago? It was before consumer broadband access was consolidated down to the point where a consumer 0 or 1 other choices other than their current provider.
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